Where Is My Mind?
by INMH
Summary: For the angst bingo challenge, prompt "Psychotic Break". Post-Madness Returns. Alice is mad, and she knows it.


Where Is My Mind?

**Rating:** PG-13/T

**Genre:** Angst/Drama

**Summary:** For the angst_bingo challenge, prompt "Psychotic Break". Post-Madness Returns. Alice is mad, and she knows it.

**Author's Note:** Gah, I want to write more for this fandom. I love this game. :3

**Disclaimer:** I don't own American McGee's Alice. It belongs to American McGee. And Spicy Horse.

()()

The world is bright and sunny, and Alice is mad.

Wonderland is real, of course it is, but of course it isn't. Reality is subjective after all; Wonderland is quite real for her, but not at all for the rest of the world. Such a shame. It's a nice place when it's not twisted by the decline of her mental health. Such a shame. Such a shame.

They'll find her eventually, hiding behind the oversized mushrooms in the Vale. They already think she's mad, of course, and eventually (if they haven't already) they'll find Bumby's splattered remains all over the train and tracks. The bastard, the rotten, rapist pimp who deserved to die for Lizzie, for the children.

Beautiful, healed Wonderland is superimposed over the dark, dirty streets of London, and while she knows this, Alice cannot tell precisely where she is. Maybe near the docks, maybe near the police station maybe near Houndsditch, who knows? She doesn't. Someone is bound to see her, bound to notice, bound to connect the dots between Bumby and her. Then maybe they'll take that pick and drive it between her eyes this time, like Nurse Cratchet wanted.

Alice is mad, but not as mad as she could be. But in this world, just a hint of madness must mean that you're completely mad, because no one ever takes her seriously, even when Wonderland leaves her be and she keeps away from the rabbit holes. She knows what Bumby was doing, but no one will ever believe her. If they think she's responsible (and for once, she is) this time they'll make sure she never does it again.

Wonderland is her reality, and maybe if she goes totally, utterly, irreversibly mad like everyone thinks she is, she'll be able to stay there. What really does she have to live for in this miserable world where everyone manipulates and looks down on her for being mad? At least in Wonderland, everyone else is mad too. As insane as it sounds, Alice realizes that she's fit in better there than she has in the 'real' world for a long time now, hellish rendition or not.

_I belong in Wonderland. Wonderland belongs with me in it. _Oh, to feel a sense of belonging is such a thing of the past, something that Alice thought had died with her parents and sister. _I don't have a purpose here anymore. And really, if I am mad and Wonderland is only my reality, then it exists only for me. I can be as useless there as I like._

"Tut-tut, Alice." The Cheshire Cat is lying above her, atop the mushroom. His paws are crossed, and his unnaturally long and emaciated body is stretched out. He shakes his head at her. "I thought you had learned your lesson about descending into madness to escape your own problems: It doesn't serve anyone, least of all you."

"And what do you suggest I do, then?" Alice retorts.

"Become not-mad."

"What do you suppose I've been trying to do all this time?" Alice is starting to get angry. In the past twenty-four hours- maybe not even that, 'real' time is blending together so badly for her- she's learned that the man who had supposedly been helping her handle her madness has actually been the cause of all of her problems for the last eleven years. She has almost no patience left for the cat and his games.

"Precisely my point. You've come too far to give up now. Take this reality-" His battered tail flicks towards a part of a building that is still distinctly London, "-and make it _your_ reality."

He disappears, just like he does every time.

Alice wants to laugh and cry all at once. "Yes, yes, and I'll do that by taking advice from an imaginary cat." She sneers in a watery voice. But she can't cry, she hasn't cried in a long, long time- since before her family died. The tears went away and the screaming came in their place.

'_Become not-mad_.' Right. And Alice suspects that if she tries to defend herself, tries to remind him of just how hard it is to _pretend_ to be sane, all he'll do is make snide remarks about the uselessness of self-pity.

Alice leans back against the mushroom and shuts her eyes. She will do it, in the end: However difficult the task, she has always persevered, always pulled through in the end (riddled with holes or not). She'll survive, and maybe one day she'll be happy again. She's no child anymore, but her life is far from over.

"Very well then," Alice murmurs, opening her eyes and trying to focus on the darkness of London instead of the light of Wonderland. "I'll try, Cat. But sanity is no easy thing; you'll see me again soon enough."

She doesn't see him as he responds, but that's not unusual:

"And we shall be waiting as always, Alice."

-End


End file.
